Status Updates From Private Investigations: Mys...

"I Want to Be A Magician" - Anne Perry
"Ghosted" - Hallie Ephron

Perry's reason for writing mysteries: "I like the intellectual puzzle and...the moral one" in their exploration of complex social issues.

Why do I feel that in Ephron's essay, it might have been Josh who communicated to Reverend Ida? The concrete is suggestive of their real estate business? However, crushing is different from "gunning"?

"Godfathers, Nancy Drew, and Cats" - Carole Nelson Douglas
"An Extra Child" - Sulari Gentill

Still think Douglas' essay is somehow more difficult to read than the others because it's snapshot-like. Also, the allusions - it helps if you've seen "The Godfather" movies.

Gentill's is absorbing: exotic culture, "madness", and who doesn't want to know who the extra child in the photo is? I thought maybe he's queer?

"Godfathers, Nancy Drew, and Cats" - Carole Nelson Douglas

Haven't quite finished, since the Cowardly Lion appeared. I'm not sure what to make of her chronology - post-modernist? Creative, nevertheless, but something...

"Remembering the Past" - Charles Todd
"Writing about War" - Jacqueline Winspear

Thought-provoking essays as to behind-the-scenes writing of mystery novels. Todd says, "when the written record is not enough, we go to England to do our research on the ground." There's something to Winspear's saying she's interested in the events/emotions that lead to a crime, not only the "who": to her, "why" is the "real mystery."

"The Mystery of My Lost Voice" - Caroline Leavitt

After much struggle, diagnosed anxiety, and half a teaspoon of baking soda in water make for a happy ending: her cognitive therapist seems to have summed it up nicely, "Find the narrative here. Find your true voice."

"The Mystery of Deception" - Lynn Cahoon

"What did I learn from this situation?...strong heroines learn to save themselves."

Sugar and spice, Jane?

"Plot Twists: This Writer's Life" - Jeffery Deaver
"Can We Live Without Mystery?" - Tasha Alexander

Strange how by the end of Deaver's essay, a print is left on the page, as if to recall his anecdote about editorial staff possibly stomping on his manuscript!

Alexander's piece strikes a chord in showing how historically - and she quotes Ken Kesey: "The need for mystery is greater than the need for an answer."

"Introduction: Solving the Mystery" - Victoria Zackheim
"I Don't Know This Word" - Rachel Howzel Hall

Thought to try and peer into some of the realities behind the mystery writers/genre...